Make Your Weekends Count!

If you are ever looking for an amazing day trip from the Dallas-Fort Worth or San Antonio area, choose Austin! It is great for staycations and amazing for fly-in trips from the Austin Airport. We checked out several neat family-friendly and millennial-friendly locations in Austin including the Capital One Cafe (actually two of them), then Erin Condren store (which is fabulous), and the downtown Austin area!

The Capital One Cafe is a MUST DO experience if you are near the Austin area. There are only two Capital One Cafes in Texas and both of these are in Austin. I've only been to one other Capital One Cafe and it was in Seattle. After I visited, I was definitely a Capital One fan for life.

When you have a Capital One card, you actually get 50% off Pete's Coffee Barista Beverages! They also have free one hour money coaching and free events! They also have Student Happy Hour, Eco Happy Hour, Hustle Live Events. Plus, these locations have free wifi and power outlets!

The two Capital One Cafes are located:

11801 Domain Blvd. Suite 160
Austin, TX 78758

and

106 E 6th St. Suite 100
Austin, TX 78701

*The Domain Blvd is located in a great location and it also has games for the children!

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Visit the Erin Condren Flagship Store

Another Austin must do included the Erin Condren store which was a short walk from the Capital One Cafe on Domain Blvd. This is the Flagship Gift and Stationary Store. This store was my dream! It has sample planners and a space for my daughter and husband to wait while I shopped and while the Erin Condren team constructed my new planner covers (I purchased three). It has an amazing accent wall and stairs that is definitely Instagram worthy AND they have workshops that are held often! I cannot wait to see what they have for December and January for goal setting.

When you visit the Erin Condren store, you should definitely consider doing the following:

1) Check out the sample planners on the wall! These sample planners are from Erin Condren influencers (bloggers and vloggers)!

2) Design your own planner cover on the back wall.

3) Have a seat in the waiting area! Or at least make sure your family sits there!

4) Use the computers to design your own planner!

5) Check out the designer Erin Condren notebooks and budgeing books!

6) Look at the Erin Condren teacher's guides! These are amazing!

7) Sign Up for the Erin Condren email list!

8) Attend an Erin Condren workshop!

9) Talk to the Erin Condren team about their favorite planners! These ladies are amazing and super positive!

10) Check out the Erin Condren exclusives! These are not available on the website!

The store is located:
11601 Rock Rose Suite 108
Austin, Texas 78758

If you are interested in checking out Erin Condren amazingness before you visit the store, check out their stationary on Amazon!

About Weekends Count - Weekends Count is a Millennial Family Travel, Fun, Food and Activities blog based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in Texas. We review hotels, travel and household items, and millennial family experiences!

East Texas is truly a hidden gem in East Texas. It is definitely off of the beaten path, but it needs to be on your radar! If you are looking for a great weekend trip away, with a reasonable ($75-$90 hotel room) East Texas is your best destination in Texas.

If you do not have children, take a scenic drive through the Piney Woods to East Texas to the casinos in East Texas on Interstate 20 and stop in Terrell, Tyler, Longview, or Kilgore along the way. These are your Piney Woods destinations. There is great fishing available and even zip lines through the very tall Piney Woods of East Texas.

1 - Longview World of Wonders Museum

2 - East Texas Oil Museum

3 - Longview Public Library

4 - Tyler Public Library

5 - Caldwell Zoo (Tyler, Texas)

6 - Ellen Trout Zoo (Lufkin, Texas)

7 - Discovery Science Place (Tyler, Texas)

If you have children, check out these "Seven TOP Destinations for Families Visiting East Texas". I visited many of these places in East Texas when I was a child and I absolutely love them. Lately, I started spending my time with my daughter at my favorite East Texas locations as well!

Have a great week and plan for the weekend! Please let me know if you have any questions about East Texas!

About Weekends Count - Weekends Count is a Millennial Family Travel, Fun, Food and Activities blog based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in Texas. We review hotels, travel and household items, and millennial family experiences!

I typically travel 2-3 times per months and this makes packing and unpacking a process that I began to dread each time. I decided to address this dread head-on and to do something about it. I began packing the essentials in one pack instead of two bags.

Also, I dread spending extra money on checking a bag. In fact, I had to not checked a bag in over 9 years. When they began charging for checking a bag with the airline, I began to pack creatively.

From packing potential medicines (headache medicine, pepto tabs, etc.) to packing additional shoes (because once I had a shoe malfunction in New Orleans at a conference), I had to pack items that I could use time and after time that I travel.

I pack all of the items listed above (at all times) in my Samsonite Underseat bag. Here's a video about my bag!

This has been the best bag for me and sometimes it is large enough for a weekend trip for my family. It has everything that I need in a bag and I never have to worry about leaving something at home because it is all there. With 15+ pockets and zipper sections, you have room for almost everything.

This bag has fit under economy seats on American Airlines and United Airlines. It is perfect for almost every adventure and in fact, I've escaped having to check my bag because it fit under the seat.

If you decide to purchase the bag, I strongly recommend that you connect with the airlines ahead of time about any seats one the aircraft that might have an added electronic panel. This panel can cause many travelers to rethink their packing strategy, because the Samsonite Underseater will not fit under those seats. This is true unless, they are inserted under the seat creatively.

This post contains affiliate links to help you build your shopping list and travel list for your family. We provide easy links for you to click to make your busy lifestyle easier!

About Weekends Count - Weekends Count is a Millennial Family Travel, Fun, Food and Activities blog based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in Texas. We review hotels, travel and household items, and millennial family experiences!

As you prepare for the holidays, please EMBRACE the fact that you probably need some new utensils and some special holiday products for the ideal meal for Christmas, Hanukkah, or Kwanza. We also take Brandless products on our travel adventures! Write this down in your calendar...

SHOP on the BRANDLESS site to save time, money, and also to find unique products for your holiday meals.

This post contains affiliate links to help you build your shopping list and travel list for your family. We provide easy links for you to click to make your busy lifestyle easier!

Whether you are providing a potluck dish for your work family, a unique meal for your children, or if you just want the most amazing dish for yourself, check out their website. I always use their products for office potlucks and themed meals!

Make-Your-Own Pasta Bars - I got you!

Organic Tomato Sauce

Organic Tomato Basil Pasta Sauce

Silicone Pasta Fork

Make-Your-Own Hot Cocoa Bars - I got you!

Organic Caramel Hot Cocoa Mix

Organic Dark Chocolate Hot Cocoa Mix

Brandless also has you for the holidays as well! From $3 Silicone Measuring Cups and $3 Organic Dried Cranberries to $3 Organic Extra Virgin Olive Oil and an amazing $3 Chef's Knife, they have it all! Check it out! Use the search box and they can help you find the best items for your office potluck or family meal!

Here's the video that we made about Brandless a few months ago!

Check out Brandless and see the amazing products they have. These products change each week and these products and my referral link (https://refer.brandless.com/s/fmajx) to your bookmarks. Have a great week and plan for the weekend!

About Weekends Count - Weekends Count is a Millennial Family Travel, Fun, Food and Activities blog based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in Texas. We review hotels, travel and household items, and millennial family experiences!

When we were in Austin for the Texas Tribune Festival, we had to stop by the Amazon Store. It was amazing, but I admit that I was very attracted to the big silver Airstream outside with "Smart Life Roadshow" on the back of the vehicle. This vehicle featured all of the new Amazon products! It had trendy music playing and even a "you are at home" doormat. I was 100% sold on the experience.

Now, I just had to be sold on the product. Eventually, I was sold and I am a believer in the products. I believe in smart homes and smart devices. Remember, I am the millennial who had a Commodore 64 computer when I was four years old.

Now, the homes are smart and the people are as well. Now, let me tell you HOW smart, this experience made me believe that smart homes make our lives easier and can save us a wealth of time and money.

Here's the Smart Life Roadshow experience.

These Smart Life Roadshow experiences featured the following products:

This post contains affiliate links to help you build your shopping list and travel list for your family. We provide easy links for you to click to make your busy lifestyle easier!

About Weekends Count - Weekends Count is a Millennial Family Travel, Fun, Food and Activities blog based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in Texas. We review hotels, travel and household items, and millennial family experiences!

Recently, we moved our daughter to the new STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics) academy in our city and it has been a wonderful experience for her. She had an introductory experience with science and mathematics through the Tarleton State University's Child Development Center. Through this center, the teachers inspired to her develop critical thinking skills and she continues to use these skills daily at the STEAM academy.

The STEAM academy has positively impacted my daughter in various ways. She continues to question "why" X (this) caused Y (that) and she has fallen in LOVE! Fallen in love with science that is! We could not be more proud of her new found relationship with the field we would have chosen for her in the first place.

As a result of this love for science and math, her love for reading and language arts (her first love) has experienced a small amount of difficulty. You know, those first loves always stick around, but sometimes you need to focus on the relationship from the "just a friend" level. So, she has her primary love (math and science) and her first love (and now friend) (reading and language arts). Both of these relationships are fundamental to her development as a young learner.

So, our goal is to discover ways to integrate the love and the friendship together to form the ultimate learning experience. All of us need friends and the love of our life! We've decided to integrate the two by participating in the reading bingo program at her academy (she is very competitive) and we will also emphasize guided journaling next month.

These are the books that we introduced to her this month:

This post contains affiliate links to help you build your shopping list and travel list for your family. We provide easy links for you to click to make your busy lifestyle easier!

About Weekends Count - Weekends Count is a Millennial Family Travel, Fun, Food and Activities blog based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in Texas. We review hotels, travel and household items, and millennial family experiences!

Black Friday is RIGHT AROUND the corner and I know that all of the moms, dads, and grandparents are attempting to figure out which toys and other products are on sale during the day (er - week) of Thanksgiving.

Remember, at the beginning when Black Friday was just held on one day and began at 6am? Well, this is not the Black Friday of the early 2000s, but this is indeed the time of Black Friday Week!

This post contains affiliate links to help you build your shopping list and travel list for your family. We provide easy links for you to click to make your busy lifestyle easier!

So, instead of dwelling on the Black Fridays of the past, let's focus on the here and now! The Black Friday of this year! The ads are already released (a week earlier than normal), but we are ready to embrace this year's event and I wanted to share a few Black Friday shopping tips and hints with all of you!

About Weekends Count - Weekends Count is a Millennial Family Travel, Fun, Food and Activities blog based in the Dallas-Fort Worth area in Texas. We review hotels, travel and household items, and millennial family experiences!